Beauxbatons University of Magic
by Vallory Russups
Summary: When Harry enrols in Beauxbatons after the war, he is surprised to find that he enjoys wandmaking, magical cooking, and going on Nicolas Flamel's insane quests. He enjoys helping out at the village and mentoring Gabrielle. He doesn't enjoy sharing a cabin with Draco Malfoy. Nope. He really doesn't. DMHP, OMCHP. Canon-compliant, EWE.


Happy Birthday, Alice! Here it is, you little blackmailer, and I hope you're satisfied ;p

To everyone else: hello, this is my first time writing a fic with Drarry as one of the main pairings. It is also Harry/OMC, and I still don't know which one will be the final one. This is a rather light-hearted, adventure-filled story with lots of magical culture exploration, wandmaking, Harry being a sweet cinnamon roll and helping everyone, magical cooking, and magical creatures. There are many creatures based on French folklore. I'm definitely including Dames Blanches, Mandagots, Tarasques, lutins, feu follets, and melusines. If there's a French creature or myth you'd like to see, don't hesitate to tell me! Actually, I would appreciate any interesting stories, myths, or fairy tales:)

This fic is canon-compliant, except for the epilogue and takes place roughly a year after Voldemort dies. Harry and Ginny are not dating. Ginny is actually busy dating Luna.

* * *

 _Chapter 1. Harry Goes to School… Again_

* * *

"What did they do this time?" Hermione asked with a tint of amusement as soon as Harry stormed into her parlour.

Ron already there, they were both playing chess – or trying to; Crookshanks mewed and rubbed his head on Hermione's knee, constantly distracting the girl. For Harry, that would be just the moment to slyly cheat, but Ron didn't. No need to. The redhead would win either way. Didn't stop Hermione from trying though.

Harry speared the human couple with a glower. Glared at the cat, too, for a good measure, which Crookshanks ignored with all his feline disdain and a lazy flick of his tail.

"Can you guess?" he bit out and dumped into a winged armchair the witch had found on a flea market in Paris when out shopping with Fleur's family and Mrs Weasley. The armchair was an awkward thing, a patchwork of green hues and suspicious stains, and Hermione had only bought it because of how Fleur's eye ticked when she saw it, but somehow Harry just loved it. It was _his_ armchair. Armed with a nail, lots of stealth, and bravery worthy of his facing-Voldemort moment, he'd even engraved his name on it in bold crooked lettering. Hermione had almost clobbered him to death right there.

"They ambushed you yet again with questions on how you got not-killed?" Ron offered while Hermione deliberated over possible chess moves.

"This was an awkward way of phrasing it, Ronald," the witch rebuked, moving a pawn.

"Sorry," the ginger muttered before sending Harry a winning smirk. The Chosen One snorted. "So, am I right?"

"It's worse." Harry stretched out, his legs dangling from the arm-rest, and rested his head against a pillow he had bought just for his armchair. "They're asking about my plans for the future."

"Well, that's actually a sensible question."

"It isn't when my future is as much a mystery to me as it is to them," Harry groaned. Lifting his chin, he scrutinised the ceiling painted by Luna, across which Hermione was engraving lines of runes in patterns known only to her.

"Send them to Trelawney. She would know," Ron said with a snicker. Hermione's fingers tightened on the edge of the chessboard at the mention of the Divination Professor.

 _And this woman tells me_ I _hold grudges,_ Harry thought vindictively. Wisely, he didn't voice his thought. With age he had come to understand how much wisdom silence contained.

"I already did," he complained aloud instead. "And, of course, thanks to the awesome bit of Potter luck, she agreed to respond to their questions- well, interrogation, more like – and now all these wild ideas are circulating, starting from the one where I'm a Death God who wanted revenge on Voldemort for escaping my clutches and who is now to return to the world of the undead until I'm summoned by the honest citizens of magical Britain to protect them-"

Harry stifled a laugh at their horrified faces.

"-and ending with the one wherein I'm actually Dumbledore's successor as a Light Lord and will work a couple of decades as an Auror until I somehow become Minister and bring LIGHT to people."

Harry put all his emotions into his eyeroll, and Hermione was much moved. Tears glistened in her eyes. Then again, it might have something to do with the fact that she had just lost to Ron for the tenth time in a row and was on cooking duty for a week.

"This sucks, mate," Ron said, extending his hands and feet with all the lazy grace of a sunbathing Crookshanks. The real Crookshanks was consoling his mistress with loud purring. "Still better than the one where you had some hidden vampire soulmate whom you were supposed to reunite with after coming into your creature inheritance."

"You're too damn cheerful about it," Harry groaned. "Stop it. Where's my good mate who beat up the guy who admitted he was stalking me because I'm his true soulmate and he has my name written on his heart?"

"Well, I was a tad a hungry back then and he _was_ blocking the doorway-"

Harry fake-sniffed, pulled out his pillow (red with a lion stitched in golden thread, of course!) from under his head, and hugged it tightly.

"Is food more important to you than our friendship?"

"Don't ask questions you won't like answers to."

"You're both so silly I don't know how we even ended up as friends," Hermione cut in, her lips twitching despite the dramatic sigh she let out.

"There was a troll involved," Harry reminded her.

"And Harry sticking his wand into its nose." Ron paused. "Wait, aren't troll boogies corrosive? How did the polish on your wand survive?"

"It didn't. Erm, or at least it wouldn't have if not for the Wand Weighing thing. Ollivander had a few words to say to me about my lack of wand maintenance skills. I was lucky that the corrosion was slow and would have taken a decade to fully eat through the protective enchantments."

"It was irresponsible of you, Harry." Hermione shook her head. "I hadn't even imagined you didn't take care of your wand properly!"

"The horror!" Ron mouthed. Harry knew it was mostly to support him; once the ginger got his own wand, he treated it like a gift from Merlin and even better than a broom, polishing and anointing it with special oils.

Harry rolled his eyes and tossed the pillow up. "I've learnt better _now_ , okay? Learnt from my mistakes, all that. Rather, let's talk about something pleasant."

"Like the glazed pomegranate pie Hermione's gonna bake tonight?" Ron piped up. He stood up and set upon putting away the chess-set and clearing away the table.

"I'm on cooking duty, Ronald, not on 'fulfilling your culinary whims' duty."

"I wouldn't mind some pomegranate pie myself!" Harry supported his friend and dodged an irritated hex from the girl. "No need to resort to violence. Don't do to your friend what you wouldn't do to a house elf. Besides, aren't we dining together tonight? So, I do get some say in the menu!"

"We are. All right, you can consider the pie done but _only_ if you bring those salted caramel macaroons we had the other day. Did you find them in one of those new places in Diagon?"

Harry knew what she referred to. The couple of months right after the war officially ended, i.e. Voldemort's death, webs of fear lingered and people clung to the habits born out of self-preservation instinct. However, now, a year past, reconstruction effort flourished. The Ministry paid special attention to fixing Hogwarts and Diagon Alley – the two major symbols of the modern magical world. The many activities included endorsing businesses and offering good deals on rent and the like, and now new shops appeared almost on a weekly basis, especially once the Unspeakables had finished the formulae needed to extend space to slot in new buildings.

Even with the subsidies, however, the start-ups often didn't have enough resources to buy out the spaces where huge shops used to be, so they cooperated into small groups of two-four and divided the floor. Harry's heart always twanged when he walked past the Owl Emporium. Now there was a millinery and a herbs shop there as well as the office for a charity aimed at giving raid victims new homes, for those of them who were left without.

He had entered the millinery, once. As always, he walked around in disguise, but the smiley shop assistant recognised him anyway. No matter how much Harry refused, they wanted to offer him a present – any hat in the shop, even including those that had magical properties, whether they came from creature parts, enchantments, or runes. Harry ceded when the boy told him his family would have been exterminated had Voldemort lived.

He had chosen a small bowler hat with white feathers on either sides of his head, and which allowed the wearer to float in the air in case they were falling to the ground. He would never wear such an ostentatious thing, but the feathers reminded him too much of Hedwig to throw it away, not to mention that he had never been the type of person to treat a gift ill.

"Actually, I made them myself," Harry said, returning to the present. He blushed at Hermione's awed sound.

"I didn't know you could cook!"

"Well, it's not like I had an opportunity to show off my skills at Hogwarts, with all the house elves there. And I would never dare take away the kitchen from your mum, Ron."

"She won't mind. Honestly? I think she's gonna be chuffed that at least someone shares her hobby. Seriously, try talking to her 'bout it and maybe you'll band together to have some cooking fun!"

"You're only so enthusiastic because if we join up, you're going to get the feast of your life."

Ron only grinned.

Suddenly, Hermione thwacked herself on the forehead. Crookshanks glowered at her because she stopped petting him. "Oh, I invited Bill, Phlegm, and Gabrielle as well."

"Want to hear some more home design advice?" Harry asked with a wink. This time, he was prepared and ducked.

"If this- _woman_ tries to vanish my furniture because it doesn't suit her tastes again, Bill won't have a wife."

"Don't worry, now that my armchair's here and Fleur hates it, I'll protect your furniture with my life," Harry solemnly swore. "But seriously, it's not our usual crowd. Why did you invite them? Not that I mind, of course, just-"

"I would like to pose some questions to Bill about his job."

Harry sat up in surprise.

"You want to be a curse-breaker?"

Not that Hermione lacked the knowledge or resourcefulness but… The girl didn't like action and adventures, and, from Bill's tales, being a cursebreaker was all about action and adventures.

"Oh, no, of course not. While this line of work does offer tantalising opportunities to glimpse into ancient knowledge through exploring abandoned ruins and tombs, this would be stressful in a way I don't enjoy. Rather, I would like to know the specifics of working with goblins as well as get whatever info I can on their lifestyle, habits, and needs."

"Is this part of your creatures and beings welfare promotion scheme?"

Hermione nodded, rubbing behind her cat's ear absently. Ron excused himself to prepare them some tea – he confessed that he never trusted Hermione to make it right.

"Do you remember the trial? The one which determined how much money we owed Gringotts for destroying their property and freeing the dragon? The goblins were treated so horribly even though we were the ones at fault. Not that we had the other choice, of course, but we did destroy half the bank overnight."

"At least you insisted on a fair deal," Harry reminded her. That trial had happened a few days after the war, and the memory was hazy. "Even if it means that a great part of your money will be going towards fulfilling it."

Of course, the boy insisted on paying everything himself first, but both his friends hissed at him, reminding him that they had broken into Gringotts together and they would pay for the damage together, splitting the whole cringe-inducing sum into three. Thankfully, even though neither Hermione nor Ron were the Chosen One, they still received gifts from the grateful population, yes, including monetary ones.

At the same time, this spurred both of them to find temporary jobs at Hogwarts and Hogsmeade. Harry joined them occasionally, but McGonagall didn't allow him to help out anywhere without paying him, and he couldn't take money for extending his help to people in need when he had enough to subsist. Thus, he donated most of the time.

He also filled his days with redecorating Grimmauld Place. With Kreacher's help, the house elf becoming more and more amicable with each day, he cleaned out the cupboards, the storage rooms, the old wardrobes… He separated the artefacts he discovered into several piles, some to give away, some to store in Gringotts, some to use, some to throw away, some to put away in a secure place so he could research their effects. He enriched the Department of Mysteries almost as much as Hermione and Ron's attic.

Ron bumped into the doorway and cursed, driving Harry's thoughts away.

"Here it is!" He called out cheerfully, levitating a tray onto the small carved table, another flea market find. Levitation to this day remained one of Ron's very favourite spells. "The best damn tea in the whole of Britain!"

Hermione frowned. "Why are there four cups?"

Ron dropped into his seat, shooing away Crookshanks.

"You get two, no arguments. One is the normal kind, which you're drinking now, and the second contains a sleeping potion because you're definitely taking a nap soon. Don't think I didn't notice that you slipped away to read till morning again."

"Hermione!" Harry exclaimed. "You spent our entire Hogwarts life convincing me to take care of myself, and now you're flaunting those same rules."

The girl flushed.

"Well, it's not like I have much time during the day! I mean, there's the job, some extra work with the Ministry because Kingsley asked for my input, SPEW, and my NEWTs are coming up!"

Harry blinked a few times and leaned forward. Ron levitated his cup into his hand, and the green-eyed boy took a distracted sip.

"Are you seriously preparing for your NEWTs?"

"Of course. There is no reason why I wouldn't." Hermione frowned at the both of them. "I get that neither of you has fully decided what you want to do with your lives yet, but you will need good grades either way."

"You're really clever but you tend to overlook some things," Ron butted in before she harangued them on the subject. "There exists a great number of professions that don't require NEWTs; actually, it's mostly just the jobs in the Ministry that do – the jobs that we both know we don't want. Besides, it's not like someone will turn away _our_ job applications-"

"For your own sake, Ronald, I hope you are not snatching the chance to use your hero status to procure yourself a job when you might not be even qualified for it! In such a case you could be robbing a specialist of-"

"I'm sure Ron didn't mean it that way," Harry cut in hastily, throwing his hands up into the air.

Hermione sniffed.

Ron gave her a nervous smile. "H-Harry's right, of course I wouldn't think of getting a job that easily! Ridiculous, really."

"Still, Harry, the reporters aside, you have to decide what you want to do in life, whether you want to follow in your parents' footsteps and become an Auror, or join the ranks of the Healers like you told me you considered, or be a DADA teacher-"

"It's still too early!" Ron protested. Harry agreed.

Hermione's gaze softened and she leaned forward, carefully tracing the rim of her delicate cup with a finger.

"I'm not trying to push you," she told him earnestly. "I'm just scared that after spending your life fighting Voldemort you have no idea that there are other ways of life."

Harry thought that her fears weren't unfounded.

* * *

The dinner with Bill and the Delacour sisters turned out to be more pleasant that Harry had believed possible. Not that he disliked them, of course, but they had few common grounds and were worlds apart. That evening, however, those common grounds were found.

It happened when Harry was trying to ignore Ron's loud attempt to prove that the Cannons would win that season and Hermione and Fleur's bickering about muggle fashion. Gabrielle remained the only calm person in that chaos, and so he turned to her.

"Are you going to miss your sister when the school starts?" he asked the girl who stopped blushing by now.

She shook her head very fast, in the same manner as some dogs do.

"Oh, but I won't be missing her this time!" she declared brightly. The translation charm distorted her voice, but it retained its tinkling, bell-like quality. "Didn't you know? Fleur is going to stay at Beauxbatons this year!"

Harry turned his head to look at the older Frenchwoman, distracting her from the spat and making her tuck away a golden curl behind Gabrielle's ear.

"Oh, 'Arry, I didn't tell you? I've talked with Madame Maxime and she allowed me to stay at Beauxbatons this year for my research and as part of my work in the Ministry of Interracial and Interbeing Relations."

Harry had known Fleur worked in the French Ministry but he hadn't had an idea about the exact department. Hermione's mouth opened.

"You," she deadpanned. "You, work in this Ministry?"

Harry winced. For a diplomat speaking on behalf of creatures and beings, Hermione didn't act too diplomatic when it came to humans.

Fleur raised her chin.

"Yes. And I don't see any problem-"

"What kind of research are you doing?" Harry blurted out. He ignored Hermione's glare. The subtle stinging hex under the table was a bit harder to ignore but he managed.

His charming smile wiped away the anger on Fleur's face, as well as the budding spat.

"It's on the customs and traditions of merpeople." She laughed softly at their stumped expressions and leaned into Bill's side. "I 'ad never imagined myself doing that either… It's just that when the second task ended, I realised that I 'ad never given a thought to the beings that dwell in the seas and lakes, and it made me think about the mer-city by Beauxbatons."

"Is it full of grindilows as well?" Harry asked, tucking away the existence of mer-cities in his mind.

"Not really, it's mostly melusines who live there but they keep grindilows as pets and slaves. Anyway, I got 'ooked on learning about the fascinating mermish culture – as well as the issues this folk is facing. I was working in the Ministry after finishing school, so I simply asked to be transferred to another department. And voila – 'ere I am! The ambassador to merfolk's senior undersecretary."

They sat in stunned silence for a few moments. Harry opened his mouth (to say something undoubtedly awkward and embarrassing because that's just the way the boy was) but Hermione got there first.

She ventured into this enterprise that was getting to know the new Fleur carefully.

"You… believe in equality for people and mer-people?"

Fleur huffed in offence and jerked her chin upwards.

"Everyone should, mon coeur! Mer-people are a very diverse and underrated race, and people treat them awfully by polluting their seas and oceans and lakes, not to mention all that magical pollution! Are you…" Fleur sat up straighter – even though no one could fault her posture either way – and squinted at Hermione, as if seeing the bushy-haired witch for the first time. "Do you find this cause worthy as well?"

She spoke in a semi-whisper, with an expression apt for someone approaching a unicorn.

Now _Hermione_ looked offended.

"Of course I do! Everyone should!"

Harry stifled a laugh while both young women blinked at each other. Then… they hesitantly smiled at each other.

The magical world is doomed, the thought popped into Harry's mind.

"'ere, I 'ave a little something for each of you, then," Fleur said and quickly dived into a fold in her black dress, pulling out an elegant purse. Harry didn't see the point of sticking a purse into your magical pocket – if you could put objects of any size in, why not stick them in directly? Why the purse?

 _Must be one of those fashion things I'm privy to._

Fleur shuffled around, shoving her hand into the "little purse" up to her elbow, before pulling out several…

"Oh no!" Ron groaned, echoing Harry's thoughts. Neither boy had thought they would see them again.

The badges.

They were elegantly done, of course, unlike Hermione's S.P.E.W. monstrosities: they came in navy blue as the backdrop, while on the front there was S.C.R.E.W. scrawled in elegant handwriting, with a little light blue anchor inside the letter "C".

Fleur beamed proudly and wandlessly levitated the badges to each member of the Trio. A look from her made Bill make a face and produce his own out of nowhere, while Gabrielle pinned hers with pride on her little face. Hermione… Hermione glowed.

"S-Screw?" Ron squeaked.

Fleur huffed again and muttered something in angry French. Unlike Gabrielle, she relied on her own knowledge of English rather than a translation charm, which allowed her to switch between languages freely. Harry was grateful. Otherwise his poor ears would have been subjected to unimaginable levels of profanity during each Hermione-Fleur epic standoff.

"It's S.C.R.E.W," she told them sternly. Hermione nodded, her lips pursed. Laughter bubbled in Harry's chest but he held it in, very tightly, very sensibly. He knew what letting it out would result it, thank you very much; he hadn't been Hermione's friend for nothing all those years. "It's the international version, which means Sea Creatures' Welfare. I hope you're proud of belonging to it now."

She raised her chin, and Harry wondered if she could raise it any higher.

 _I hope she doesn't because then the back of her head will meet Bill's chin, and he probably won't appreciate it._

"I'm sure we're going down in history as the proud first members of this… society," he muttered. Fleur beamed, and he almost felt awful for the sarcasm. Then he looked at the badge he was holding, smooth and shiny and… _Screw_. No, maybe he didn't feel too guilty.

"I'm really glad the Headmistress is supporting the cause now," Gabrielle interrupted his thinking process.

Fleur rolled her eyes.

"'ow could she not? Monsieur 'agrid loves animals, creatures, and beings."

She winked at Harry.

"Wait," he said as a thought came to him. "How could you tell us that there is a city of mer-people near Beauxbatons? I mean, your school is Unplottable, but anyone could just research the location of all the cities and deduce where it's situated, no?"

"Oh, it doesn't work like that, 'Arry." She sighed. Even though she could make her accent disappear by now, she still preferred to retain traces of it, especially omitting the first letter of his name. Harry didn't mind. Rather flattering, when a beautiful girl had a nickname for you. "The city I'm talking about is protected by Beauxbatons University, which means that it's Unplottable as well. Although you'll find mentions of it in books, you will never be able to read and understand its exact location. Even if you visit it, the location will be blurred from your mind the moment you leave."

"The way magic works is amazing."

Fleur smiled, while Gabrielle chimed in, "The same with the university village."

"Wait," Harry had to say again. "Why do you keep saying 'university'? Isn't Beauxbatons, you know, a school? Er, Academy. Or something."

Both girls blinked at him.

"There is the Academy, and there is the University?" Gabrielle offered, looking up at Fleur for guidance. "But Madame Maxime is the Headmistress of both!" she added in excitement, focusing on the entirely wrong details, as far as Harry was concerned. "She's really amazing and clever and-"

"Now, Gaby." Fleur tapped her sister lightly on the forehead. Gabrielle pouted. "I'm sure 'Arry doesn't want to 'ear all your fangirling. I'm pretty sure he wants some… more substantial information."

"Of course, Harry could have researched this himself," Hermione butted in with a look in Harry's direction. "Honestly! You participated in the Triwizard Tournament, how could you not read everything about the schools you were competing against?"

Harry shrugged and stabbed a baby octopus on his plate. "I wasn't really worried about the rival schools, I was a bit more worried about the _dragon_!"

"And then grindilows," Ron muttered into a pint of beer which Bill had brought as a present. "And You-Know-Who."

"Oh, who cares about the dragon now!" Fleur interrupted impatiently. She always had a habit of doing that whenever Ron talked, much to the chagrin of the redhead. "The Tournament was ages ago. And the University is now. Basically, it's one of the places where you can study once you finish school."

"Like muggle universities?" Hermione asked hopefully. She had always complained about the absence of magical colleges in Great Britain, no matter how many times Ron told her that there were small schools, correspondence courses, apprenticeships, and Ministry training programmes for further education, but for Hermione that didn't seem to be _enough_. For her, just _studying_ wasn't enough. She wanted something like Oxford or Cambridge: not only knowledge, but also the community, the atmosphere, the _student life_ to which she had been preparing before Hogwarts.

Fleur shrugged. "I 'ave no interest in the muggle world. Beauxbatons University offers courses in advanced core subjects, etiquette, humanitarian sciences, arts, and several specialized subjects such as wandmaking. You can either live in the village or take classes by owl post."

Harry turned his head to Hermione and stifled a smile. He had a suspicion that Beauxbatons had just got a new student.

"You know," Gabrielle spoke up with a rosy flush that muted the freckles dotting her nose. "Even though it's summer, there is so much going on! Extra summer courses, student fairs, projects, contests… Do you want to stay with us and try it out, Harry? Maybe you'll even like it and go to school, too!"

Harry blinked. Pointing a finger at himself, he asked, "Me?" The young man laughed. "No way! I'm not touching another essay in my life! Nope."

 _This is ridiculous. Can't everyone see that I'm not study material?_

"There are many practical subjects, as far as I know," Bill told him, rubbing his chin. "Some of them, I think, you'll enjoy – from what Ron and the twins tell me. For instance, there is a Magical Cooking course. Or Care of Magical Creatures class, which is far more practical than that of Hogwarts."

Well, cooking… sounded exciting, Harry had to grant him that.

He had loathed cooking for the Dursleys. The breakfasts would be particularly abominable, because he would catch whiffs of bacon crust, make Nutella spreads, pour juice into a carafe… and then watch as the Dursleys devoured all of it while he only had the right to a single toast with cheese on it. Dinners usually went better. Unless his magic acted up, he would be allowed some meat and a bigger portion, but even then he could never eat to fullness. They had never starved him, but a part of him had always longed for something.

When he started living alone, he anticipated cooking to be a problem, a chore once again. At first, he had charged Kreacher with it… and Merlin, had that been a disaster! Harry wiped away the image of the half-destroyed kitchen from his brain. He tried to eat in small cafes and diners strewn across Hogsmeade and Diagon for a while, because Kreacher's ears would always flap sadly when Harry inevitably choked on his food, but Harry didn't really appreciate how costly it was. He would rather donate than spend all this money gorging himself on food. So, he just ate less.

Finally, Mrs Weasley came. Hermione relayed to her Harry's food-adventures, which inspired the matronly woman to- oh no, not simply feed him, even though she always brought a basket of her cooking, but also to teach him how to prepare food.

And this time, he could eat it freely, too.

Harry's eyes bore into Gabrielle's imploring ones. She folded her fingertips together.

"Can you at least try?" she repeated. Harry remembered how often Fleur told them that Gabrielle had few friends at school. "Madame Maxime will surely let you stay for a month to see whether you're interested in any subjects. Just a month! Please?"

Harry spied a smirk on Hermione's face and sighed. Of course he wouldn't refuse such an emphatic plea.

Well, it's not like he had busy days. Not like his friends. Maybe visiting Beauxbatons would be a nice change of pace.

"I'll think about this," he grumbled.

* * *

AN: If you're reading "Design Your Universe", my other Harry-in-another-school fic, don't worry, I'm not going to substitute it for this one. DYU will be prioritised; this is just a gift-thing. Actually, if I hadn't been sick for the past 2.5 weeks, there would have been an update already. Now, chapter 6 is halfway finished.

Please follow me on tumblr: valloryrussusups is my writing blog, valloryr is my personal blog.


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